Hey. I'm about to begin my senior year of college as an English major with an emphasis in creative writing, and well...I've never thought about how to apply my major to a career. Frankly, I don't know the first thing about what I want to do. I choose this major because I very much enjoy reading and writing, and I figured effective communication would fit into a job somehow. I have no internships or networking to speak of, but I did sign up to help edit the school literary magazine this coming year.
I thankfully haven't gone into debt at all over this decision, and in fact I will be leaving college with about 71k in savings (I was gifted 100k by my grandparents for college with the expectation that I'd go to an ivy league school. I chose to stay in state instead and contributed a couple thousand through part time work) But it's very disturbing to look forward and not see the path before me.
I'm wondering how I narrow down what I want to do. How do I pick a job that will satisfy me and make money enough to live? Am I fucked because I don't have any "professional" experience already and no idea how to get my foot in a door?
Thank you for reading.
I have a creative writing degree too, and I also got it without debt. That's a great start, and I agree that the $71k could get you started in real estate if you're interested in that. There's a lot of wisdom on these fora if you want to go that route.
What I think you should do now is read a few books on choosing careers, read up on what careers there are that would value the degree you have and also read about some people that have taken a more self-styled route.
A few books I've found useful on figuring out what you'd be happiest doing:- Do What You Are (
http://www.amazon.com/Do-What-You-Are-Personality/dp/0316167266)
- What Color is Your Parachute? (2013 edition is here but any recent edition will do:
http://www.amazon.com/What-Color-Your-Parachute-2013)
- The Pathfinder (
http://www.amazon.com/The-Pathfinder-Lifetime-Satisfaction-Touchstone/dp/1451608322)
- A Life at Work: The Joy of Discovering What You Were Born to Do (
http://www.amazon.com/Life-Work-Discovering-What-Were/dp/0767922522)
A few ideas about careers particularly suited to English majors:- Becoming a literary agent:
http://mediacareers.about.com/od/mediajobprofiles/a/LiteraryAgent.htm- Becoming a book editor:
http://mediacareers.about.com/od/mediajobprofiles/a/BookEditor.htm- Becoming an advertising copywriter:
http://www.kuraoka.com/how-to-become-an-advertising-copywriter.html- Becoming a grantwriter: read "Writing for a Good Cause" (
http://www.amazon.com/Writing-Good-Cause-Persuasive-Nonprofits/dp/0684857405) and do some googling. On a related note (related to this and to advertising copywriting), google how to get into marketing.
- Becoming a teacher of English as a foreign language (this can be a fun way to travel the world; I've done it):
http://esl.about.com/od/esleflteachertraining/bb/bydecidetefl.htm- Becoming a librarian:
http://www.ala.org/educationcareers/careers/paths/librarian (note: do not get the recommended master's in library science unless you've spent some time working in libraries and think you'd enjoy this--look at the link on that page about becoming a library assistant or technician; try working a job like that before you decide if you want to actually become a librarian).
One last note on careers for English majors: the market for college professors of English and/or writing is HORRIFICALLY BAD. If that's a job that nevertheless interests you, go to the forums at the Chronicle of Higher Education (chronicle.com) and ask for advice. Long story short, to have a chance of landing a job, you need to do a PhD in composition and rhetoric (NOT in English literature) and you need several publications before you're out of grad school. If you want to go the professor of creative writing route, you need to publish some novels and get either an MFA or a PhD in creative writing--but the essential thing is, you need to publish some novels and/or short story collections (I'm assuming you do fiction rather than poetry? If not, the "need to publish books" advice still stands). And I do not mean self-publish.
A few about people who made up their own careers:- What Should I Do With My Life? The True Story of People Who Answered the Ultimate Question (
http://www.amazon.com/What-Should-Do-My-Life/dp/0345485920/)
- Losing My Virginity (Richard Branson, who started out in magazine publishing, an obvious path for an English/writing major like you) (
http://www.amazon.com/Losing-My-Virginity-Survived-Business/dp/0812932293)
- Famous people with English degrees--if you like the jobs any of them are doing now, read up on how they got there:
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/16-wildly-successful-people-who-majored-in-english-134415857.htmlMore famous people:
http://www.english.heacademy.ac.uk/explore/resources/careers/grads.phpMore famous people:
http://faculty.ircc.cc.fl.us/DEPT/English/Famous%20English%20Majors.htm